Since I am perennially a man without a hat, I can make that joke in conjunction with taking delivery of my new EFTS safety squat bar.

Did some empty bar reps in the living room to get a feel for it after I attached the handles. I think it’ll work out well.

Now, if I can dispel the tightness, soreness, and swelling from my right ankle/calf/knee so I can try and squat heavy to explore my approximate 1RM tomorrow, that would be lovely. I’ll be thrilled with 405#, and not dissatisfied with anything over 365. Deadlifts are similarly mentally anticipated to have lost about 10% from my PR last year, so 455#+ is really what I’m looking for with a conventional pull.

Benching was a surprisingly non-deprecated 245# (only lost 20# off my PR despite the months and months of injured discomfort and bullshit) and my overhead press was a nearly complete shock – a 15# PR of 180# (I was really hoping for a 1xBW rep @ 190#, but 185# wasn’t getting up more than halfway).

Currently crafting a new lifting routine. The two naming candidates are “BSOD” and “666.” Number of surprised people: 0.

As previously noted, fucking off time is over. My plan right now is to go to six days a week, three lifts a day. This is informed by an amalgamation and distillation of my own experience (independently, as well as my tenure under Josh Bryant’s guidance) combined with a recent exposure to and curiosity about the so-called “Bulgarian” school, tempered by a cursory review of Jason Ferruggia’s program[1].

Yes, it’s the first of the month/year/thing, and I actually woke the fuck up and busted out the tape measure. Timeliness and shit, not to mention taking full advantage of all the resolutionist momentum that everyone else in the world is going to be bandwagoning the living fuck out of.

So, hey, here’s the state of the meat at the dawn of 2012, going into a de-load week before testing my maxes and moving into the next phase of things.

And, if you’re good, there will be Yet Another Phone Shot (YAPS) to go with each of these updates moving forward. Nothing spectacular, just me, standing around in my office wearing a pair of shorts. No lighting tricks, no flexing, nada. Those conditions are not the case in the photo at left; that’s racking 165 after doing some head-supported rows with the flattering (but very fucking hot) halogen in my garage overhead.

Under ideal conditions (smart headspace, spotter, etc), I’m pretty sure those would be 265-275, 365, 165, and 465-475, but I’m stronger all the way around than I was when I started with Josh (12 weeks ago) by about 10%.

… it’s that “weightlifting” thing I used to do. Five weeks since the break, and, other than needing to stretch my wrist, and not move the pinkie & thumb in certain (read: painful) ways, things are more or less back to where they should be, so I can resume my reset after the rep-calculating work just prior.

15/9/3 – Overhead Press & Squat

Warmup:

Overhead Press: 2×10 @ 45 / 1×10 @ 65

Squat: 1×15 @ 45 / 1×10 @ 135

Work Sets:

Overhead Press: 3×5 @ 85 / 3×5+3 @ 95

Squat: 3×5 @ 175 / 3×5+5 @ 195

I curtailed both before the heaviest set in the interest of not overdoing it. I will probably revisit these same weights, just adding the 105 / 215 (or 225) top end sets next session.

Backing off to ~65% of the 1RM from a couple weeks ago, and restarting the ascending sawtooth wave. That’s the plan, anyway. It’s going to be treading some water until after vacation, plus the whole broken hand thing. This is the one lift that the splint actually helps, since it keeps my wrist from bending back. I was more cognizant of resting my butt on the box, instead of just touch-and-go as a depth check.